I saw the Man on the Ledge trailer and figured it worked that way. Pretty exciting, and over quickly. What more could there even be?

If I’d ever not believed the various movie award ceremonies were entirely political, I might be surprised at the number of nominations Hugo received. Wait, don’t tell me, was it the Oscars? I know not these things.

Anyway, it wasn’t a bad movie, and it had it’s moments: and the last half had a pretty good story. But the hour-long lead-in didn’t mesh and had some rather unfortunate implications at that. Say, part one was all kid’s fantasy (not wrong, but gaping plot holes without the joyousness of cross-over childhood fantasy successes like HP) and part 2: fairly decent discovery movie for everyone, though with rather odd pacing due to the exposition.

Don’t get me wrong, it was worth watching, it just wasn’t very good.

When I saw the nominations for the animated movies I thought they’d just included every one made that year. I’d forgotten all about Tintin (since I haven’t seen in yet—this weekend, yay!)

Kung Fu Panda 2 was actually pretty good though—did you see it? I thought it ended up being a better movie than the first one, and stood on it’s own pretty well. I mean, it had a good story and liked the family theme. I’m sensitive to the topic of adoption & families, and thought they handled it really well. Puss in Boots though. Well, I didn’t dislike it as much as I thought it would, but still, what’s it doing there?

Better than a Pixar movie?

Wow, I might actually have to cave in and see this.

I have a feeling that the awards people just didn’t like Tintin. I haven’t seen the movie, so I can’t judge, but that’s been my impression.

Better than a Pixar movie?

Better than Cars 2, at any rate.

Uh… it says “movie” up there. Not commercial.

I'll not be held accountable for Disney's marketing strategies.

But, touche nonetheless.

What? I’m totally confused now.

Cars was super popular.

Was it really? Maybe this is my bias talking, because I came out of the theater not impressed. But in any case, Disney realized that merch sales from the movie went way up so yeah…Cars 2.

The questions raised by the setting were often troubling.

This. Though I did love the original movie.

Also, thanks, Rocky, now I have to see Tintin.

Puss In Boots is kinda awesome though.

I take it it sucked? (I can’t seem to see any conversation about it on here)

The questions raised by the setting were often troubling.

This is one of the things that bothered me about Cars (other than just hating the characters and plot in general). Why are there cars? How do they reproduce? What happens when they break down? Why was there a train in the first one? Why do cars need romantic relationships?

I’ve seen parts of the second one while babysitting, but I didn’t pay close attention because I really wasn’t interested.

And I guess I need to see Tintin, though I wasn’t that interested in it, with all the raving, I kinda have to see it (when it comes out on DVD, that is).

The key thing about those other movies, is they all take place on the underside of the “real” world. Cars… where the hell does Cars take place? Some kind of crazy bizarro world with no people in it, but all the trappings of human civilization.

@sansa – you know, that’s a really good point. Any of the other movies, they could conceivably really happen in our world, just in an alternate universe where there used to be a Woody the Cowboy TV show and some famous explorer had a blimp in South America and some fish escaped from a dentists’ office once.

Although… the Incredibles pulled off a totally different world. Still sort of based on our own, but… it goes to show it can work, it just didn’t in the second Cars movie. (I thought the first one was OK.)

The clues are there if you're looking for them.

I just really hope it lives up to my expectations. With all the hype, I can’t help but think that this is going to be the next Twilight.
And then I watch the trailer again and think, nah, this is going to be epic.

Anyone heard of “Safe House”?

The tagline seems to be “The CIA’s greatest weapon just became its greatest threat.”

Is it as bad/cliche as it seems?

I checked out that spork a few days ago--I only got a few chapters in, so I can't say for sure, but it seemed like the biggest complaints the sporker had were general "wait what this isn't quite how things work", which I think is excusable if the book has good enough prose and engaging characters/plot. Which, IMO, the book does.

I think it’s a decent book, but it’s been blown up way beyond what it actually is. ‘Course, People also think that Twilight is an example of great literature. . .

Check out Tom Kratman’s Watch on the Rhine sometime ; )

It looks like it’s part of a series. Would it make sense if I picked up in the middle?

Edit: Ok, the book is part of series, but the movie is by itself. It looks rather cool. I’ll have to take a look at it – old movies have so much character to them.

Oh, I have no illusions about the book – it shouldn’t be considered an epic example of ground-breaking literature, but it was a whole lot of fun to read. I mean, hey, I like me some broccoli, but I always like a slice of chocolate cake now and again. ;)

I seem to remember farla coming to the same conclusion actually. The primary reason for the spork was the over-hype about the quality of the original as ‘great literature’ and she had some issues with Katniss as a icon of empowered female heroines, IIRC.

I saw Tintin this weekend and really liked how they brought that sort-of kid’s pulp fiction to life, so to speak (sorry, I don’t know what else to call it!) It’d be great if they used the technique to tell other stories like it, and make it a sort of series—Tom Swift, etc. It was fun, though, and positively rollicking. But there were some scenes in there that just went on too long, I thought, showing off the visual effects. Can’t afford to watch movies in 3D and refuse to ever fall the 3D tv fad, so scenes that take advantage of it don’t work for me. Still, nothing has ever been as bad as the 20 min segment in the Christmas Carol movie that came out a couple years ago with Scrooge being chased by death? or something? So boring.

bq. Is the book pro-Nazi? As in, “Yay! The aliens are helping the Nazis!” Or is it, “OMG! The aliens are going to bring back Nazi Germany! Everybody, do something!”

Neither one really. They're not allowed to bring any of the baggage from the first they time they were young and the only real nazi in the book is killed by one of the characters (The impression I got was that the re-juved SS veterans didn't care about that anymore and know as well as anyone that the days of the Nazis are long gone). There is a scene where the re-juved SS veterans and the young germans who've joined the reformed Waffen-SS go and put down a riot and arrest some conspirators.

Also, I forgot to tell you this, Tom Kratman _hates_ liberals. I personally don't give a damn either way about politics so I didn't care about that. But it is very much chocolate cake as you put it.

Opinions on Black Swan? I’ve recorded it because I’ve been wanting to see it for a while.

Yes, this is a double post, but today I went to see Chronicle on a whim, completely forgetting that it was the film I’d wanted to see since I saw a couple of months ago that it had Wallace in it.

Well, I saw it, and it was pretty cool. Even though the main kid was sort of unbelievably screwed up, I really enjoyed it considering it was another one of those “found footage” movies. Also, Wallace was a pretty cool guy.

it had Wallace in it.

THERE’S WALLACE, STRING

THERE THE FUCK IS WALLACE

Seriously though, I want to see that movie. I love me some Michael B. Jordan.

it had Wallace in it.

Woah. I thought he looked familiar, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on who exactly he was.

I watched that. There’s a third trailer now, but it’s not that different. I think there’ll be a commercial for it during the Super Bowl tomorrow night . . .
On another tangent, I just finished watching Deathly Hallows, part 1. AWESOME! Everyone was great! Unfortunately, the library doesn’t have Part 2 yet, and I can hardly wait.

I have to say, re the Hunger Games, the actress that plays Katniss is a really good choice. Her accent and appearance and everything is just how I imagined.
And Rue’s melody at the end!

the actress that plays Katniss is a really good choice

Initially I think there was an internet shit-storm, but I always thought that she was perfect (despite not reading the books, hur hur hur).

I actually got round to watching Van Helsing aaannd ….. I don’t see why people made such a big deal of it.

Also, I was casting back through this thread and found a discussion about Nazis and Watch on the Rhine.

Anyone ever hear of this movie called Iron Sky? It was this Atom Punk alt-history thing where Nazis reached the moon first and set up a colony there, and then twenty years later they came back and there were explosions and cool dogfights and irreverent humor. Made by this Finnish independent group, but I can’t remember if it ever saw a release. I just saw the trailer a few years ago.

I thought Van Helsing was so famous because it was hilariously awful.

Van Helsing is fun if you’re in the mood for something a bit hammy. But not if you want a serious action movie.

@sansa: Please explain to me how something involving a vampire fighting Nazis ( undead Nazis at that) is in any way overrated.

@Inkblot: Yeah, I’ve heard about Iron Sky, and it hasn’t been released yet. The movie has a youtube channel, and they just released a new trailer here. And it looks pretty awesome.

I just don’t think it has enough substance to make it into the heavyweight class people often try to put it in.

This. I did like Hellsing a little, but it wasn’t that great.

And as for Van Helsing, I know people can be pretty stupid sometimes, but that movie was really awful and the way they carried on about that thing was just wrong. Sometimes you can enjoy silly stuff if you turn off your brain, but that’s what I was doing. Late afternoon, feeling all warm inside the house as it poured outside (YAY!! FINALLY!!), I decided to just lay back and watch the thing. I wasn’t all that alert, but that movie still made me go: What the hell, constantly.

@ sansa: Gotcha, thanks.

@ Apep: I’ll have to check it out.

Watched The Green Hornet. It was pretty dumb, but Kato was awesome. And now I dislike Rogan even more than I did before.

First, yeah I know people are very tired by now of hearing everyone’s interpretations on Inception, but this is the first time I’ve heard what’s below. Was Cobb the one inception was being used on? This kind of made sense and I wondered why no one brought it up before. I found it interesting. And a bit irritated that I never considered it myself before.

There’s probably plenty of holes in this guy’s theory, but I’m too tired to find them right now.

I watched True Grit. As much as it’s usual to be disappointed with something that people praise a lot, I wasn’t.

I still need to watch the old one.

bq. Yeah, I thought it was really good, too, especially the ending. It felt so… realistic.

I loved the how the colors were kind of muted but really rich. It reminded me a little of the Sherlock Holmes movies.

I finally watched The Social Network last night. It was good. Poor Eduardo.

Phantom of the Opera at Albert Hall.

I watched it three times this weekend because I am lameass and have no life.

A friend of mine and I are going to see The Help this Friday.

@Puppet – I haven’t seen the movie, but that’s pretty much sums up what I thought of the book. It was entertaining, but towards the end, I had to suspend w-a-a-a-y too much disbelief.

Liked Fight Club. Just not a great chunk of the beginning.

I watched Snatch. That’s definitely a movie I needed to watch with subtitles. All those accents. >.<
I didn’t think the film was at all bad. It was very entertaining at least.

And I rewatched Babe during the past weekend. Adorable. <3

Saw The Secret World of Arrietty in theaters.

The art and animation were beautiful. The soundtrack was breathtaking (save for that horrible pop song Disney made for the end). The story wrapped up a bit too neatly and felt thin at points, but was still fun.

Why did this movie only get 8 million in its opening weekend.

Yep, based on the Borrowers and, from my recollection of the books combined with Wikipedia’s synopsis, a pretty faithful adaptation at that.

Oh my God, I want to see Arrietty. The Borrowers were my favorite when I was little.

As for movies I've seen, I watched Chronicle last week. T'wasn't too bad, lots of throwing stuff around with telekinesis.

(Also I'm posting this while trying to watch Thor. It doesn't seem to be working. Damn you, piracy, I thought we were friends.)

*EDIT*
THOR HAD EXPLOSIONS AND ASS-KICKING. WHICH MEANT I LIKED IT. I'M NOT PICKY WITH MY MOVIES OKAY

Finally got my big brother to watch Star Wars Episode One (The new 3D version)

His reaction? “%$#!@ Jar-Jar! Who ever thought that would be a good idea?!”

He’s not even a fan, I’m not sure he’s even seen the originals. :D

Definitely, though I was very, very bored for the first half hour. Hidden for bad language.

The very end is my favorite :D

Ahaha. I watched the film at home and since I had just rebooted the decoder, the language options had gone back to the default setting ‘Family’. At that scene it took me a while to realize why the sound was cut off so suddenly and stayed like that for a while. XD